h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Thank you for sharing this with us in h2g2.

Very thought-provoking... My grandmother didn't write me letters, but I did enjoy conversations with her. In particular, she liked talking about her schooldays, but only once did she mention the actual name of her school - I was so surprised to hear the new detail that I remembered it and was able to look it up on the internet a few years later. Unlike my schools that have all gone now, her school actually survived and is still going strong today It is good to know these details

I still didn't get a reply from my mum or sister about this, so I don't think they're interested, but I'll provide a short extract here. This is what she wrote on the topical subject of snow:

"We used to have several quite fierce snowstorms down here on the Island, but now they don't last long enough to settle. It must be this Global Warming, because we always had snow in Birmingham before the war and during the war when we were living in the country between Warwick, Stratford on Avon and Henley in Arden.
There was one winter on the Island when I couldn't get from Cowes to Newport to go to work at the County Hall because of the snow. The buses didn't run, but it only lasted a couple of days. I had a lovely time, I went on foot around Cowes, with George's father on the milk round. In 63/63 [I assume she means 1962-1963] the rivers at Lymington and on the Island froze over, and it was Salt Water. I remember the edge of the sea at Cowes also froze.
There was one year since David and I have lived in the bungalow – either 1976 or 77, when I made a snowman on the front lawn. David took a photo of me with the snowman, I must look it out sometime. David worries about the water pipes freezing in the house.
David and I went over the Saint Gotthard Pass one year and the snow was 10ft high either side of the road, which had been cleared just enough to get the traffic through. We have a photo somewhere of my snowballing. While we were out of the caravan a couple of skiers came down one side of the mountain, crossed the road, and then disappeared down the other side. This must have been in 1988 when we went to Italy and San Marino, a 3-week holiday, and we covered 3,200 miles going through Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and Italy and coming back through France."

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